


Hunger

by cantbreathe



Category: All For The Game - Nora Sakavic
Genre: AFTG Reverse Big Bang, Cyborgs, Fluff and Angst, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Violence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-29
Updated: 2019-03-29
Packaged: 2019-12-18 15:13:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,129
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18252425
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cantbreathe/pseuds/cantbreathe
Summary: “Still don't know what I was waitin' forAnd my time was runnin' wildA million dead end streets andEvery time I thought I'd got it madeIt seemed the taste was not so sweetSo I turned myself to face meBut I've never caught a glimpseHow the others must see the fakerI'm much too fast to take that test”- David Bowie, “Changes”This fic is based on some wonderful art:http://cats-are-assholes.tumblr.com/post/183803742989/for-the-second-part-of-my-cyborgau-for-theGo check it out!





	Hunger

**Author's Note:**

> Please let me know if any inaccuracies, juggling canon and the effects of cybernetics, and angst was wild. There are graphic depictions of violence and also a mention of needles/hospital setting so be careful.

The concrete walls of the Nest blurred into nothing as a dozen Ravens crowded Neil into the corner with their cleats.“Every time he speaks, every time he opens his mouth, break him.” Riko crossed his arms, glaring down at the ragged fox between the legs caging him.

Neil could barely see him past the shin guards glinting red and black in the awful fluorescent lights. Before he passed out, he caught a glimpse of eyes so dark and cold he understood for a second Kevin’s paralysis at the thought of looking into them again— at the thought of those eyes looking back.

—

Neil awoke with a start. Handcuffs pinned him to Riko’s headboard and he struggled against them. As soon as he stilled, his escape attempt feeble and fruitless, a figure stepped out of the dark where he’d been leaning out of Neil’s sightline. Neil tensed up for a new reason: a solid reason corded in muscle and armed with cruelty.

“Nathaniel,” Riko said, “it’s good to see you’ve accepted your fate.”

Bullshit. Neil hadn’t accepted anything. And Riko sure didn’t want to be dealing with Nathaniel. Neil would have said as much but his mouth felt glued shut. But it wasn’t glue or tape or rope. He wasn’t gagged. His one last shameful shred of self-preservation strangled him. He kept his mouth shut.

As much as Riko liked the sound of his own voice, he remained quiet too as he approached Neil. He enjoyed this too much. Neil felt a mounting dread that threatened to push him over the edge into panic. He was just about to break and ask what the fuck was going on when Riko unlocked the cuffs.

Neil sat up slowly, his eyes never leaving Riko. He swung his legs over the edge of the bed when no orders or insults were forthcoming. Riko just watched. His smile stretched his lips and bared his teeth like a hyena, snarling silently. Neil didn’t look away.

He placed his feet on the ground and a tingle went up his spine starting at his toes. The dread that had risen in him before crashed over him again. In the moment that Neil snapped his focus to his legs Riko advanced in a few short strides. He stood over Neil close enough that his breathing was audible.

“You like the upgrade? You’ve got full sensory detection and we went ahead and disposed of the skins. They weren’t fooling anybody.” Riko stepped closer, forcing Neil to put his feet on the floor to lean away.

The spike of sensation and the cool concrete under his toes made his eyes water. Neil’s mind reeled as flashes of semi-consciousness erupted in his memory. It was mostly pain— an awful buzzing in his head and a searing hot knife in his legs as somebody attached his nerves to cold, foreign prostheses.

“What-?” Neil’s voice ground out like gravel. He couldn’t speak. He felt the ground beneath his feet for the first time in 10 years and no words would come.

—

At the airport two weeks later, Neil makes a phone call to Wymack. The bustle of the airport disorients him after his time in the Nest. Practically falling apart, Neil barely registers Wymack’s voice when he answers.

“You have a good reason to be bothering me on a holiday?” Wymack’s voice greets him after the fourth ring.

“I didn’t know who else to call,” Neil rasped. His voice was ripped and raw from screaming. He hardly recognized it.

—

“Good afternoon, Neil, how are you doing today?” Bee crosses her legs and pulls her glasses from her face to clean them.

Neil shrugs, glancing at her then out the window behind her desk.

“Coach says you haven’t been eating,” Bee states lightly. “Is there anything I can do?” She sounds so concerned but Neil doesn’t even try to look for the words. He finally brings his eyes back to hers. No one speaks again for the next 57 minutes.

—

A few days later Neil pulls Andrew’s car into Easthaven’s parking lot. Nicky and Aaron hang back as their small group approaches the hospital doors. The receptionist is shocked at Neil’s appearance, specifically the bruises haphazardly scattered across his face and neck.

“Are you all right?” She looks thoroughly shaken.

“We’re here to pick up Andrew Minyard.” Neil doesn’t bother acknowledging her question.

“That’s not what I meant.” She purses her lips. When she realizes she isn’t going to get an answer she gestures to the sign-in sheet. “I’ll notify Dr. Slosky of your arrival.”

Nicky, Kevin, and Aaron each scrawl their names without really seeing the paper in front of them. Neil hesitates with the pen over the clipboard for too long. Riko hadn’t let him be “Neil” in two (three?) weeks. He was met with pain every time he answered to Neil. A cracked rib here, a nearly collapsed lung there. The Ravens had not known what else to call him, and, as far as Neil was concerned, he had no other name.

His hand shakes as the pen finally makes contact with the paper. He takes a deep breath and forces his instinctive tension down.

The four boys crowd into the waiting area, Nicky and Aaron take the two separate chairs and Kevin and Neil share the couch.

Neil is nearly asleep when Kevin startles him by speaking. Kevin doesn’t look up from his hands but Neil can hear his hesitation.

“I know what he’s like,” Kevin tries softly in French. Neil turns his full, slightly bleary attention on him. “Riko. I mean. If you want to talk.”

Oddly enough, Kevin’s attempt at sensitivity comforts Neil. Kevin’s nature does not afford consideration or consider tact. Revered for his talent, and expected by the Moriyamas to play the perfect game, Neil doubted Kevin had any first-hand experience with compassion.

Except with the Foxes, with Wymack and Dan and Renee and Nicky and Matt and Andrew— even Aaron.

The thought that he made the right decision to go to Castle Evermore rises again and thaws some of the ice in Neil’s veins.

“Thank you.”

Kevin seems to struggle for a moment before continuing, “I know what he’s like, but I can’t—“ he falters. “You are different from me. To the Moriyamas you are like Jean, a debt to be payed, property.”

“I am not property,” Neil bit back. He did not say that that his wrists still ached where Riko had chained him up. That even though he couldn’t feel the tattoo beneath his fingers it burns on his cheekbone like a brand. He was thoroughly made to feel like property. Neil isn’t blind.

Movement down the hall keeps Kevin from replying. Grateful for the distraction, Neil snaps his eyes to where Andrew exits the double doors.

Relief washes over him and for a moment he forgets his body. But, Andrew’s blank stare causes a different kind of pain to rip through his chest like a spike. Andrew looks at each of the boys in turn, lingering only slightly longer on Kevin whose face is a little worse for wear— Matt had taken issue with his choice to keep Neil’s Christmas plans a secret.

They exit the hospital in silence and Andrew makes a bee-line to the dumpster. He empties the contents of his duffel into the bin and makes his way to the car. He doesn’t wait for the others to follow.

There is a moment of tension when Nicky walks behind Andrew to the driver’s side. Neil can feel Kevin flinch next to him. Andrew raises his hand but it’s only to swing the door open. This is less than boring to him. It’s inconsequential, nothing. Neil feels hollow and powerless and it’s almost enough to take him back to the Nest but he holds his breath and stands his ground. Like he’s always done, and how he’s determined to show Andrew he always will do.

—

Neil holds his breath as the needle enters his spine. Andrew had followed Neil and the nurse into the exam room under the pretense of providing comfort but stuck to the edges of the small space. Neil lay on his side facing him trying not to wince. He wants his face to match Andrew’s.

He feels bare in his paper hospital gown, hyperaware of the bruises covering his skin. Thankfully, from his spot against the wall, Andrew can’t see Neil’s busted up back.

“Fuck,” Neil breathes harshly. He grasps at the bed, struggling not to make a sound. They couldn’t give him anesthetic because of the legs (his legs, though he’s hesitant to claim them) but the procedure, one among several others, is necessary to gauge the extent of the Riko’s handiwork. He closes his eyes for a moment and when he opens them he is met with Andrew’s voice.

“Yes or no.” Andrew seems to be barely holding on to his air of calm disinterest. And Neil is not up for their usual game. He doesn’t stall.

“Yes,” Neil grits.

There’s a hand on the back of his neck and another, slightly colder one, gingerly wiping the tears from his face in an instant. Neil wishes he could take moment to wonder what he and Andrew are, but even that thought is fleeting and filled with discomfort.

Instead, Neil holds Andrew’s gaze and feels the rest of the world melt away. The lumbar puncture still hurts like hell. But it’s only temporary. Andrew’s steady support feels anything but.

—

 

“It looks like everything is in order,” the doctor says, satisfied, “Congrats on the upgrade.” Neil doesn’t even know the man’s name.

“The pain should subside,” the doctor continues, “And your appetite should return shortly. You’re a healthy, young man and a college athlete to boot. If there’s one thing that’s guaranteed…” His voice trails behind him as he leaves the room.

“They’re yours,” Kevin says in disbelief. “Why would they do that?” He looks like he can’t choose between feeling amazed or feeling nauseated.

Neil knows why.

Andrew ignores him, having returned to his usual unaffected self after taking care of Neil. Neil rolls his eyes before turning back to Kevin.

“He’s making me a target. The hair, my eyes, my legs— the media won’t be able to splash my face on covers fast enough,” he says in shaky French. Neil’s hands twist, restless, in the hoodie he pulled over his hospital gown.

“And,” he continues in English, “I can feel pain.”

“What do you mean?”

“It’s a part of Riko’s upgrade. I have sensation in my legs. I had to know, so I tested it out. And I can feel pain too. Some experimental shit.” He does not look at Andrew.

Neil resists the urge look at his legs. He doesn’t because if he lifts the blanket his toes will get cold. If he was a normal kid who got these upgrades through the proper channels this would be a complete nonissue. It would be exciting even.

“Oh, fuck me.” Kevin breathes out loudly in exasperation.

—

“Good afternoon, Neil,” Bee begins. Neil limps in, aching from practice, but still refusing to sit out.

He nods to Bee, acknowledging her greeting. She smiles softly.

“Have you considered resting like Coach suggested?” Bee knows the answer. Neil just raises his eyebrows in a way that’s not supposed to be humorous. Bee huffs a laugh anyway.

They have a mostly one-sided conversation for the first half of the session. Silence reigns for the remainder of their time together. Neil tries not to think about how he hasn’t been able to eat a whole meal since he got back from the Nest.

—

The sound of the door opening and the other Foxes creeping in doesn’t deter Wymack. He soldiers on, giving Neil the rundown.

“Almost every player in the game has some sort of enhancements. You already know about the rule changes and allowances they had to make over the years,” he opens his hands, demonstrating the widespread nature of the matter. “You yourself are well acquainted with the first tier of regulations in accordance with your previous class of prostheses.”

Neil nods as he’s expected to. He knows where this is going. A hand comes to rest on his shoulder and he briefly tenses before he recognizes Matt. He has callouses from his racket etched into his dark skin. They remind Neil of the hours and hours of practice it took to get here. To get to the games. To win the games.

“Neil,” Wymack says gently. Neil’s eyes snap back up to Coach.

“You’ve hit the third tier. You have top-of-the-line —experimental— legs and because your bionics are both above knee and THRs you’ll be watched more closely. You can’t make a mistake. You’re an auto red card for any illegal move and even though you’re a striker you have to start at home court.” Wymack took a deep breath and then held it, waiting for Neil’s response.

Wymack seems like the type to call all his players “son”. But after all this time of being a father to the Foxes they can never let themselves forget that they’re not his kids. Neil almost laughs. He almost glances behind and to the left where he knows Kevin is lurking. Where Kevin is looking at his father and his father is looking at his son.

“Is that all?” Neil closes his eyes, knowing full well that there’s something he’s not saying. Coach’s eyebrows draw together and he presses his lips into a hard line. He looks to the floor then back to Neil as if this is hardest thing he’ll ever say.

“You can’t be Court.”

—

A few weeks later, after their win against the Trojans, Neil is kidnapped by his father’s henchman and woman in Baltimore. Unlucky for them, Neil is raring for a fight after having to sit out half the game because of his stupid, experimental high-tech legs.

—

To be fair, Lola had expected him to fight back. She just didn’t expect for him to win. His brain is white noise as he leads Lola into his father’s house at gunpoint.

Their mistake had been stuffing them into a trunk together with a loaded weapon. He struggled against the gun muzzle digging into the base of his skull. She wouldn’t shoot to kill. He was promised to his father. As soon as she lowered the gun to target somewhere safer he jerked back forcing her to aim lower. A shot was fired. It ricocheted off his legs and hit her.

He felt her body jerk against his and guessed it must have pierced her leg. Before she could react, Nathaniel pulled his arms around his legs to free them from behind his back and turned to face her. He grabbed the gun.

“Fight and I’ll shoot both your knee-caps,” he said in an odd echo of earlier threats. She just growled, eyes watering. He made her free him and open the trunk. The cops who had been driving the patrol car were off somewhere with their colleagues, examining the damage to Nathan Wesninski’s property— a red-brick mansion with a four port garage and a pool house.

Now he presses the muzzle of the gun to the base of Lola’s neck, leading her directly to the side entrance of the house without stopping. They go directly to the basement where Nathaniel knows the Butcher conducts the bulk of his business. He ties Lola up and takes her shoes for good measure. His mother’s words rattle around in his head and moves as if on auto-pilot. He grabs the largest cleaver he can find and tucks it away.

DiMaccio, his dad’s live-in bodyguard, comes down the stairs swinging. His father isn’t far behind, but Nathaniel is strategically positioned behind the bodyguard.

So Nathaniel raises the gun and shoots his father in the shoulder from DiMaccio’s blind spot. Nathan growls and launches himself at Neil who tosses the gun aside and picks up the mallet he snatched from the patrol car’s trunk. He swings and catches his father across the jaw.

Out of the corner of his eye though, DiMaccio rises like a shadow, easily four times his size and four heads taller.

He barely ducks in time to avoid getting his skull caved in.

Nathaniel scrambles from between the two men only to come up against Lola and her knives. She isn’t smiling anymore. She takes a swipe at him but slides just out of range and kicks her in the chest. He puts the full force of his enhanced legs behind the hit. Something inside her snaps. He grabs the shotgun he hid between two of the Butcher’s worktables and shoots her in the neck where she is splayed on the ground.

Huge arms wrap around Nathaniel’s neck, pulling up and back, threatening to suffocate him. He throws his weight back, going where DiMaccio pulls him, putting both of them on the ground with their combined momentum. Neil twists out of DiMaccio’s grip, yelping when the other man scrabbles to keep a hold of his burned up arms.

He kicks DiMaccio in the face. Once. Twice. He goes down slowly, a tree falling in burning forest. He shoots DiMaccio once before the Butcher takes a swing at Nathaniel. He feels the slice of a cleaver cut clean, but shallowly, across his back from the top of his right shoulder down to his left side. He feels himself scream but doesn’t hear anything.

Nathaniel faces Nathan who is bleeding an awful lot from his left arm where his son shot him. Nathan grins savagely.

“Where is she?” Nathan asks, loud enough to be heard over the ocean in Nathaniel’s head.

“Where is who?”

“Your mother,” Nathan says with the patience of man who thinks he’s going to win.

“You killed her, or don’t you remember?” The twitch of his father’s eye must be the closest he comes to shock. Nathaniel tries to bask in that for a moment.

“Liar.” His father lunges forward with the cleaver and Nathaniel has to leap back. Back towards the worktables.

He scrambles backwards on his hands and heels, feeling around for the concealed weapon.

“Looking for this?” Nathan makes a show of unloading the magazine and the lone bullet in the chamber of the gun he commandeered from Lola.

“No,” Nathaniel grits out. His hand finds the blade first and he drags it out of its hiding place. His father’s smile turns acidic as he sees what his son grasps in his hand. Once Nathaniel gets a good grip on the handle he swings forward.

His father knocks the knife out of his hand quickly. Nathaniel does his best to take as many hits with his legs as possible. It burns but it’s better than bleeding. Once Nathan realizes what he’s doing it’s all over.

The Butcher drops his cleaver and reaches for a mallet instead. Nathaniel tries to run, to reach the cleaver just a few feet away. His father trips him and he falls to the ground with a grunt as the wind is knocked out of him.

No pain will ever be worse than what he knows will come next. His father brings the mallet down Nathaniel’s legs five times before throwing the tool to the side and picking up a sledgehammer instead. He tries to scrabble away between hits but the pain soon becomes fire licking its way up his whole body. Tears stream down his face unbidden and he screams so loud he’s sure the police camping out on his father’s lawn will hear him.

Then the pain stops and the basement is blessedly silent.

“Where is your mother?” This again?

“Dead! She’s fucking dead, you m—” His father cuts him off with another swing of the sledgehammer. Pain sings up Nathaniel’s left leg. Then something odd. It stops altogether. He scrabbles forward again even as his father lands several more hits against his numb legs. Must have shook the connections loose? Whatever happened it was enough for Nathaniel to believe in God for a few seconds.

He grasps the shotgun that slid behind the weight-bearing pillar, next Lola’s blood-spattered face. He turns and shoots at his father without really aiming. He hits Nathan’s uninjured shoulder and then aims for his legs. The older man crumples, the hammer falling from his grasp.

Now, Nathaniel kneels in front of his father where he is bound, not out of reverence, but because he can’t stand up. His legs are crumpled and twisted behind him in a troubling heap. They throb just where his flesh meets the metal. He takes that as a good sign.

Nathaniel breathes heavily out of his nose, thinking about how Andrew looked the last time he saw him: standing in the visitor’s locker room at USC. He was sweaty and had terrible helmet hair. His eyes had glimmered— the closest thing to a smile since he’d come back from Easthaven.

He turns his father’s face to look him in the eye. Nathan has the wild look of a trapped animal, bucking and spitting and raring to get free. The gag in his mouth, his two shot shoulders, and his bound legs prevent him from doing any of those things.

“You thought you were taking something from me,” Nathaniel grins ferociously. “You thought you could debase and mangle your son, destroy his mother, and take what you think is yours. And I just want to thank you.” He tightens his grip on the Butcher’s face. “Thank you so much.”

Nathaniel shoots his father in the face point-blank.

His uncle and the FBI arrive not long after. They find a scene not unlike a massacre. The woman who burned Nathaniel’s face lies in a heap next to the man who used to protect his father. Both of them have deep gouges and huge bruises blossoming on their skin.

Nathan is splayed on the ground, a bullet wound in the center of his fore-head. Nathaniel feels only vindication like fire burning in his chest, eating up all his oxygen.

—

“Good afternoon, Neil,” Bee says. Her voice is quiet, almost muted in Neil’s ears. She bites her lip, fighting the urge to ask how he is.

Neil struggles into the room. He wants to scream. He wants to run. He can’t even fucking walk.

He sits in the chair in front of Bee heavily, leaning his crutches against his left replacement leg. Neil stares for a moment at the metal touching metal, willing himself to feel it. To feel anything. He knows he won’t but he wishes.

“Wymack says you’re still not eating,” Bee begins, “I know we haven’t ever really spoken, but if you want to keep playing the first thing you’ll need to do is eat.”

Neil’s stomach clenches with nausea at the thought.

—

A month before their face-off against the Ravens, Neil sits numbly in his dorm wishing he had the motivation to do something, anything. He should be practicing with Kevin and Andrew tonight but—

Neil stares mutely at his new-new legs. He…sees— them— he feels them. But, not the way other people do. He can feel the metal cold against his flesh where the machine meets the meat of his thigh. Hell, he can even feel the chill of the titanium hip replacement beneath his skin. He only has half of his original femur bones in either of his legs.

Guess that makes one, he thinks distantly.

They’re real. They’re yours, he tells himself. A good standard pair of prostheses, made specifically for Olympic athletes. For Court. He’s even supposed to have minimal sensation. But he doesn’t. Because they’re not his. Renee speaks before panic can rise in Neil like bile.

“You need to talk to someone.” Renee is matter-of-fact but gentle, “It may as well be Bee.”

It takes him a moment to remember himself. He drags his eyes up to meet Renee’s. She perches on their kitchen counter, watching Neil where he sits on the floor against the back of the couch.

“What would I even say?” It’s a dumb question. Renee indulges him because she can see the fear and pain etched into every line of his body.

“Anything. She’ll get you where you need to go,” Renee replies softly. Her legs dangle from the counter, swaying in an unconscious rhythm that Neil can’t reproduce in his own limbs. He closes his eyes and reaches out in his mind for his legs. But he keeps coming back with nothing. Nothing’s there.

—

Neil remains silent for the first 45 minutes of his hour with Bee. He feels hollowed out and raw raw raw. His crutches lean against the arm of the overstuffed chair he has sunk into. He can’t look at them. He can’t walk without them.

Just when he can’t take another second in the room she speaks. He had come in with such purpose. She was as convinced as he was of the resolve he had found. But it had gone as soon as it had come. Nausea and grief claim the space it left, turning his stomach into a roiling grey sea.

“Neil, I believe you came here for a reason,” she pauses, “and I’m willing to give you all the time you need, but...,” she trails off.

You don’t have time, she doesn’t say.

He doesn’t know what to say. He doesn’t know if he even wants to say anything. His instincts say no, his instincts say yes. Run or stay. Live or die.

His brain says run but the gaping hole in his chest keeps him frozen in place. He’s stayed too long. People have crept into the gaps left by the scars fracturing his steel hull. He overflows with salty sea water, drowning.

His mother would kill him if she were here. She would have hurt him for this.

“I know that— Of course I know—“ He cuts himself off. He swallows hard, leaning forward from where he’d sat as far from Bee as possible. Her glass figurines wink into view and he reminds himself of their fragility.

“Tell me what’s going on Neil.” Bee doesn’t adjust herself, she’s been ready all along.

“I can’t— I- I- I- just, I can’t!” The yell rips itself from his throat before regains control.

“I couldn’t play exy. First, my father keeps me out of the game my whole life. Then Riko takes my chance to be Court. Then the man who took exy from me in the first place gave me another chance at the game all over again— but these legs. These fucking legs,” Neil laughs but it sounds like a sob, “they’re not mine.”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean, they’re not. Fucking. Mine.” Neil looks anywhere but at Bee.

“Can you tell me what happened in Baltimore?” Bee asks calmly.

“Can I?” Neil looks at her wildly. Can he tell her? After the FBI gave him his life back Neil had been going through the motions, half alive. Andrew had avoided him after their reunion at the hotel. Neil didn’t know what to do. The feds may have given him his life, but Andrew gave him his name. He missed him like nothing else. Not even his goddamned legs.

Bee doesn’t say anything.

And the words begin to pour from Neil.

Nathan Wesninski. The Baltimore Butcher. A businessman. A husband. An amoral sadist. Never a father.

Neil leaves feeling...something. He forgets his crutches in Bee’s office but doesn’t realize until Matt makes a comment a few hours later.

 

—  
Neil feels like a walking open-wound for a while after his last session with Bee. It’s great in practice, but he isn’t even really aware of it until he snaps at Nicky.

“You think I want to be like this?” He shouts unabashedly, “Don’t you think I wanted to be practicing with rest of you? Don’t you think I want to be normal?” He is not proud of the way his voice breaks.

Nicky gapes at him for a few moments, mouth opening and closing several times.

“Andrew?” Nicky mumbles, eyes looking past Neil.

“What?” Neil glares up at Nicky. Suddenly, there’s a cold hand on the back of his shirt collar, dragging him up and back. He fights but then the hand twists Neil around.

Andrew lets himself look furious for half a second then— nothing. He lets Neil go and glances at Nicky. Whatever he sees must satisfy him. He turns to leave.

“Since when do you protect Nicky?” Neil rasps, shouldering his way past Andrew. He’s feeling dangerous— like a knife resting two inches too close to the flesh of his throat.

“Since when do you yell at my cousin?”

The raw ache in his chest intensifies. He’s the son of the Butcher. The son of a man whose temper is legend. Was.

“Nicky,” Neil says after a minute of not being able to meet Andrew’s eyes. Nicky is frozen, caught between Neil and Andrew’s brewing storm.

“Yeah?” Nicky asks uncertainly.

“‘M sorry,” Neil says, locking eyes with the taller boy.

Nicky’s eyes seem bright for a moment but then he just smiles at Neil. He moves past Andrew, giving him a wide berth, and pulls Neil into a hug.

 

—

They train hard even with Neil at less than full power. He has to sit down more often than he wants to but at this point he’s reached his limit. Period.

After a particularly harrowing set of drills, Andrew approaches him and puts a hand on his shoulder. He steers Neil to the door of the court and shoves him out neatly. He continues to march Neil towards the locker room and Neil can’t even protest. In all honesty, he had started seeing double half an hour ago. The only reason he hasn’t passed out is because of sheer stubbornness.

“Clean up,” Andrew leaves no room for argument. He leans in front of the door that leads back out to the court. Neil wasn’t even going to try to fight it. He begins stripping numbly, not bothering to use a stall. He can feel Andrew’s eyes on him but it isn’t anything but analytical. He catalogues all of Neil’s hurts with his eyes, trapping every detail in his head from one blink to the next.

When Neil is done showering, dressed, and still a little damp Andrew goes and showers himself. Neil tidies their gear on auto-pilot. Andrew doesn’t say anything about his immaculately organized locker when he returns and Neil doesn’t expect him to.

He also doesn’t expect Andrew to march him to the cafeteria. He swipes in and gets two plates, handing one to Neil. He piles food onto both before leading them to a booth in the back.

“Eat.” Andrew digs into his plate his motions mechanical.

A wave of nausea overwhelms Neil. He’s hungry. He knows that’s what the nausea is. But he desperately does not want to be sick. He doesn’t want there to be anything else wrong with him.

Andrew sighs loudly and picks up Neil’s fork. He scoops up some of the mashed potatoes (of course there’s nothing but carbs on their plates) and puts them in front of Neil’s mouth. He watches Neil with expectant eyes. His mouth waters but he is still afraid to eat.

“It’s ok,” Andrew says. It sounds like a promise. Neil manages to finish his mashed potatoes and a piece of bread and some chicken. At one point he takes the fork from Andrew to shovel food into his face more efficiently. It’s the most he’s eaten since returning from Edgar Allen.

“I’m sorry about the other day,” Neil says without pretense.

“Nicky already forgave you,” Andrew shrugs, watching Neil closely as he focuses on not spilling anything. Neil starts to feel uneasy for an entirely different reason now.

“Stop thinking,” Andrew orders, but his words are soft, no venom to be found. And if that isn’t its own brand of dangerous.

Before Neil can say anything, Andrew slides out of his side of the booth and into Neil’s.

“Yes, or no?” Andrew’s voice is a hum vibrating against heart.

“Yes,” Neil says but Andrew doesn’t move. He shifts forward hesitantly into Andrew’s space, afraid he will shift away. “Yes, or no?” He echoes Andrew.

“Yes,” Andrew replies quietly, eyes never leaving Neil’s.

Neil leans in and kisses the other boy then. It’s a breath of fresh air after a week under water. He feels suddenly miles away, on the cousins front door step, Andrew is pressing a key into his palm. He’s home.

They break apart after a few seconds, satisfied just to be in each other’s space. Neil didn’t think he would ever get this back. He didn’t even know if he had it in the first place.

“You killed them,” Andrew says as if Neil didn’t know. Neil breaks eye-contact, fiddling with the layers of bandages on his hands. Andrew takes Neil’s hand in his flesh one gently; Neil wouldn’t know he had touched him at all if he hadn’t been looking.

“Yes,” Neil says, even though he’d told the FBI the whole story with Andrew at his side. He waits for Andrew to say something else, to give any indication as to where this conversation is going.

“I’m sorry.”

Of all things, Neil thinks, this is the last thing he expects Andrew to say. He grips his hand a little tighter— enough to sting his almost healed lacerations. Neil returns the pressure.

“It’s okay.” Neil’s voice is hoarse. “It’s something I needed to do.”

Andrew shakes his head, pulling Neil in close so that their foreheads touch. Neil can see it in his eyes that he’s having trouble finding the words. He puts a hand on the back of Neil’s neck, squeezing in way that is comforting. Neil goes lax in Andrew’s hands, letting the other boy take his time.

When the words don’t come, Neil cups Andrew’s face with his hands, parting them so he can get a look. Something flickers in Andrew’s eyes. Danger, danger.

“It’s all right if you don’t want— I’d understand it if— I know I’m damaged goods,” Neil finishes lamely.

Andrew blinks a couple times before anger takes over his face. The sudden change in demeanor raises the hairs on the back of Neil’s neck.

“If you’re damaged goods, then what am I?” Neil takes a moment to process what Andrew’s said.

“What? Oh, no, that’s not—”

“101%”

“When did I hit 100?” Neil lets himself sound incredulous, he’s grinning now. He feels like he has whiplash from the sudden shifts in mood.

“102.”

Neil runs the pad of his thumb under Andrew’s eye which is still slightly bloody from the riot at USC. Neil laughs outright then. What a fucking pair.

—

Foxes beat Ravens in brutal striker’s match

By: Vicky Vale

MORGANTOWN, W.Va. - The Palmetto State Foxes won against the Edgar Allan Ravens in a bloody battle for the Exy national championship title tonight at Castle Evermore.

Offensive Dealer, Dan Wilds, led her team admirably against the previously indomitable exy powerhouse. Wilds, the first female captain in NCAA Class I history, continues to push back against nay-sayers and low expectations. She sets the bar high, but so do her teammates.

Former Raven, striker Kevin Day, and surprise favorite for US Court striker Neil Josten, set the world on fire this season on and off the court. Many say this combination is what brought Palmetto State out of the dark and into the running for the national championship.

The teams tied at 1-1 at the end of the fourth quarter. According to the ERC, teams containing one or more enhanced individuals are not to engage in overtime. Instead, they concocted a tie-breaking method— the striker’s match.

Day and Riko Moriyama faced off in a striker’s match this evening with Day choosing Wilds and goalkeeper Andrew Minyard as his 2nd and 3rd. Moriyama chose two backliners, Reacher and Johnson.

In this short-game, Day and Moriyama went head to head. Multiple penalties were called on the Ravens who engaged in illegal targeting. They got one good hit on Wilds, but she got right back in to the game.

As most striker’s matches tend to, it turned into an intense game of keep away with most of the pressure falling on the goalkeepers to keep their respective teams in the running. Moriyama made a surprise move and allowed Reacher to take a shot at the Foxes’ goalkeeper and guarded Day himself. This role-swap however, backfired, allowing Day and Wilds to make the winning goal.

“Kevin was always number one,” Josten rioted after the game, “Riko never stood a goddamn chance.”

 

The rest of the Foxes declined to comment.


End file.
